Climate activist disguised as old woman throws cake at Mona Lisa painting in the Louvre

Let Mona Lisa eat cake.

A man wearing a wig and lipstick who arrived at the Louvre in Paris in a wheelchair smashed a cake into the glass protecting Leonardo da Vinci’s 16th-century masterpiece in an apparent climate change protest.

The 36-year-old man, who has not been publicly identified, was detained and sent to a police psychiatric unit, the Paris prosecutor’s office said Monday.

A security guard cleans the smeared cream from the glass protecting the Mona Lisa at the Louvre Museum Sunday.

“Think of the Earth,” the man shouted as security escorted him away during the incident on Sunday. “There are people who are destroying the Earth. Think about it. Artists tell you: think of the Earth. That’s why I did this.”

The cake thrower also tossed roses as he was dragged off. It’s unclear what, if any, charges have been filed.

Video from museum-goers showed officials wiping the creamy residue off of the painting’s glass enclosure.

The Louvre said Monday that the Mona Lisa was not damaged “in any way.”

The painting, valued at around $870 million, has been on permanent display at the Louvre since 1797 except for a few special circumstances, including during the Franco-Prussian War in the 1870s and World War II.

In 1911, it was stolen by an employee who thought it belonged in an Italian museum. In 1956, a man threw a rock at the painting, shattering the glass case, leading to the bulletproof glass.

While it was hanging in the Tokyo National Museum in 1974, a woman spray painted the shield red to protest the lack of access for disabled people. In 2009, a Russian woman angry at being denied French citizenship threw a ceramic teacup at it.

With News Wire Services